(SPORTS SWAP)
My name is Britt Eerland, I'm from Holland
and I play table tennis.
It's my sport, it's my passion.
Three words to describe myself -
I'm spontaneous, driven and fun.
(OLYMPIAN RIO 2016)
Blair Tarrant, I'm a New Zealander
and my sport is hockey.
I'm a defender.
My strengths are disrupting all the skilful attacking.
It was a massive honour to play
at the Olympics for New Zealand.
I just totally missed the ball.
That was tough. And I was terrible.
(SPORTS SWAP)
(TABLE TENNIS/HOCKEY)
Hey I'm Britt.
Hey I'm Blair, nice to meet you.
Nice to meet you. Have you ever played like this,
or only on camping for fun?
I've played with a few friends but not like this.
- Are you a little bit afraid? - Yeah, a little bit nervous
about hitting the ball, to be honest.
You have to hit the ball over the net,
it will be more difficult, but we will find ways, no problem.
I have played table tennis before at a very low standard.
The ball does a lot in the air by the looks of it.
It's going to be tough.
My ambition is to hit the ball back over the net,
simple as that.
Well, Britt, welcome to Hockey Club Rotterdam.
Have you ever played hockey before?
Erm, I can't remember.
I think when I was 12 years, but it was a long time ago,
and I think maybe once.
Table tennis for Britt will directly translate in terms
of the reaction time and the reacting to what a player does
and what the ball does in a game,
but maybe just the running and the intensity of the game
will be difficult for her.
I'm quite excited, but I hope I will not be too bad,
so we will see about that.
(THE KIT)
I will explain to you a little bit
about the racket or the bat.
A lot of people play different, like defence or attack.
If you are attacking, you play with a faster racket
and if you are defending, you play with slower,
because you want to have more control
and play more balls on the table.
I prefer this, too - I don't have pimples
so that I can play top spin or under spin.
This is a hockey stick, here,
this is my stick, I'm a defender,
so my stick is 37-and-a-half inches long.
The midfielders and strikers
will have a smaller stick for their skills.
For me, I'm here to stop people,
so my stick's a little bit longer.
With hockey, everyone on the field plays right-handed.
So there are no left-handers?
- No. - OK.
So, the other equipment we have,
so, shin pads, obviously to protect our shins,
so they're nice and hard.
Half the players will wear a glove.
Often in hockey, you'll get broken fingers or broken hands
and the most important one is the mouth guard.
All right, Britt, here's your stick.
- Let's get into it. - Thank you.
(THE INTIATION)
We'll do a little bit of a warm-up.
The first exercise my coach will give is, like,
backhand middle, backhand forehand.
I will show you, and after, you can try.
Cool.
Good luck!
I hope that was enough training.
We will play one set now, so that you can see
how Olympic level will be.
OK, let's do it.
1.
1-4.
4-1...5-1.
Ooh, it's a difficult serve.
5-2.
9-2,
10-2.
- Ah, man! - Thank you.
- Thanks. - 2 points, though.
I really enjoyed it, it was good fun.
I was terrible, I thought I could return a few serves,
but as soon as she started spinning it, it was tough.
I missed some balls because with his forehand
and the touch, it was still different balls for me,
but still, these kind of balls
are quite easy for me to return.
The challenge for you is to score a penalty shootout.
But to make it harder for you, we're going to have
- a goalkeeper in goal. - OK.
Right, so I take the ball from here, into the circle
and I'm trying to score past the goalkeeper.
I have eight seconds.
Can I go home?
Yes! Britt, now it's your turn.
Eight seconds, score a goal past the keeper.
- Good luck. - I'm kind of nervous.
Oh, my God!
This is so difficult. The keeper needs
to save the ball!
- It was out. - You got round him.
- Yeah! I got round him. - How did you find that, Britt?
Quite hard.
I thought I'm right-handed, so I can use my right hand,
but in the end, I have to use my left one
and I'm not used to using my left hand,
so it's quite difficult for that.
Hockey is a sport where you really need the basic skills
and I think someone like Britt will be able to pick that up
in a month or so, but it's really tough
the first time you come out here and try it.
(PRE-MATCH RITUAL)
I'm giving you some music.
I don't know what to do.
I've got a few rituals. When I'm warming up, I dance.
Hooo...!
From the beginning, I really start slow,
then I go up and up then I really prepare my body
and my head to really go 100% in the match.
Hey!
(THE BASICS)
I think it's important that I first teach you
how to hold your racket.
If you give me your hand, do the same with your racket.
This finger on your rubber. Yes, good.
You have to point the racket
where you want to play the ball.
This was a little bit open,
so that's why the ball went over the table.
Yes. Good.
Really good rally.
I lost concentration.
It's the same, like in the backhand,
you stay like this, now it's the opposite,
so open your racket a little bit.
Yes, and play it back to the front.
And now try to do this on the ball.
It's really funny, you're so tense.
I'm trying to concentrate.
Yes. Now you have the forehand and the backhand.
With hockey, the basic skills that we talk about are footwork
and low body position.
We're always here and we have to have good footwork.
It's really important that your right hand is down here
nice and low and it's nice and loose.
So, go up to the first cone and then around.
- Ah, so... Argh! - Yep.
Nice and loose, both hands.
It's tough. If it gets too close,
it's really hard to control, too far away,
really hard to control.
Do you want to spin it?
Nice.
I'll try now to teach you some facts about table tennis.
Top spin. You go over the ball and I'm trying to...
Yeah, that's a good one.
On the spin, you go down into it.
On the table it's a little bit easier to see
that the ball will come back, that means it's on the spin.
- Let's try it. - We'll try.
Yes, see.
Generally you start like this, you open the ball.
You throw it and you go in.
I like this because when you serve,
you can do it with all your body going into the ball.
Yes.
Yes, that's it. That's the service.
Yeah, nice.
OK, Britt, what we're going to do is some goal scoring.
So, we're going to go around this piece of wood here
and try and hit the ball in the goal as hard as we can.
So go up nice and slowly, here,
push the ball towards the goal...
And then hit. Off you go.
It sounds so hard. I will try.
I just tried to hit and I just totally missed the ball.
OK, two tips which might help you a lot.
First thing, hands together.
Second one, when you hit the ball
you want to be in line with your front toe.
Good.
Nice.
Yeah, that's good.
- Yeah! - It's in the goal.
(THE DIET)
This smells good. Do you eat something special,
especially on game day?
On game day, so we really make sure,
three hours before a game, we have a good meal,
so often it'll be pasta or a sandwich,
depending on how you feel. One hour before the game,
I'll have a peanut butter sandwich...
Peanut butter sandwich, that's good.
..and some water and then 30 minutes before I warm up,
I'll have some caffeine,
so that's kind of a set structure.
- What about you? - Normally, I always try
to have food with me because if I'm hungry
during the game I cannot play.
So I've always something with me that I can eat.
Do you have any foods that you love to eat
but you probably shouldn't?
Yes, chocolate.
(THE CHALLENGE)
So, let's see if you can make a few more points than before.
Bring it on.
(ONE SET)
(FIRST TO ELEVEN)
1-0.
After she talked me through it,
I could return a couple of shots and it was good fun.
I'm stoked with what I learnt.
I think I've got worse!
Ah yes!
- Ah. - Off the net.
He stopped much better my service
and in the end, he could even play on the table.
You must have speed. 7-1... come on.
You cannot go from the forehand to the backhand
and it's not good enough technique.
- 2-8. - I think I was better.
And when Britt gave me the ball
where I knew it was going to go,
I could probably return it,
but as soon as things got complicated,
I didn't stand a chance.
Oh, no!
Thank you!
It was already much better than before
and we got some more rallies, so that's good.
The hardest part was returning the spin
because I had no idea where it was going
and I had no idea where it was going off my bat, either.
(FIVE ATTEMPTS TO SCORE A GOAL)
OK, so we've done some training now,
we've got the goalkeeper back.
It's your time to score, off you go.
It was harder than I expected.
I didn't know that if you went to the goal,
the keeper would come to you,
so this was also a little bit scary.
OK, let's try again.
There's a million different skills you need
to master to become a good hockey player.
- Go the other way this time. - How?
That way was probably harder. Yeah.
Blair was patient and he tried to explain to me good.
OK, your last time, Britt.
All the best, I know you can score.
Go.
You didn't score, but you definitely got better.
- Did you think you got better? - I think I got better,
it feels more professional now!
It looks a bit more professional.
Good.
Yeah, I was hoping
she was going to score the goal at the end
but the keeper, to be fair, did pretty well.
Britt would definitely get her own back
if he went and played table tennis with her.
I found out first-hand.
(SHOWBOATING)
(AROUND THE NET)
(THE SWIVEL)
(AWAY FROM TABLE)
(CROSSBAR CHALLENGE)
(FIRST ATTEMPT)
(SECOND ATTEMPT)
(SPORTS SWAP)